PC freezing and then black screen? GPU?

[Relax']

Hello all,

 

I have started to get this random problem on my PC, basically everything is fine and then out of no where it will freeze for a couple of seconds and then take me to a black screen and stay there until I do hard reboot. Sometimes it will go black and restart on its own, other times it just stays black. My monitor still have signal, although I did see it have no signal at one point. Another time it would just freeze when I was browsing the web and then it would stay frozen for a few minutes instead of seconds and then goes black and reboots, and for the first time yesterday it failed to POST, no beep just stuck on the motherboard splash screen. It seems to happen whenever, regardless of if im playing games or completely idle, I am trying everything but just can't find the cause. It started 3 days ago and nothing really changed on my PC, it went 24hrs without doing it yesterday and then did it 4 times in 3 hours later on.

 

• I have tried a clean install of Windows
• Reinstalled all drivers.
• Re-seated the RAM and GPU
• Checked all the fans in the case are spinning and monitored the temps
• Done a Windows Memory Diagnostic
• Performed a check disk for bad sectors and drive errors

 

I just need to find what is causing the problem, GPU, RAM, PSU or maybe even my SSD?

 

My build is:

Gigabyte Twin Turbo OC GTX 970

Asrock A320M Pro4

AMD Ryzen 1500X

GeIL Dragon AMD Edition 8GB DDR4

Kingston 60GB SSD

Corsair TX 650W PSU

 

Any help would be appreciated! 

 

[TwilightRavens]

31 minutes ago, Relax' said:

Hello all,

 

I have started to get this random problem on my PC, basically everything is fine and then out of no where it will freeze for a couple of seconds and then take me to a black screen and stay there until I do hard reboot. Sometimes it will go black and restart on its own, other times it just stays black. My monitor still have signal, although I did see it have no signal at one point. Another time it would just freeze when I was browsing the web and then it would stay frozen for a few minutes instead of seconds and then goes black and reboots, and for the first time yesterday it failed to POST, no beep just stuck on the motherboard splash screen. It seems to happen whenever, regardless of if im playing games or completely idle, I am trying everything but just can't find the cause. It started 3 days ago and nothing really changed on my PC, it went 24hrs without doing it yesterday and then did it 4 times in 3 hours later on.

 

• I have tried a clean install of Windows
• Reinstalled all drivers.
• Re-seated the RAM and GPU
• Checked all the fans in the case are spinning and monitored the temps
• Done a Windows Memory Diagnostic
• Performed a check disk for bad sectors and drive errors

 

I just need to find what is causing the problem, GPU, RAM, PSU or maybe even my SSD?

 

My build is:

Gigabyte Twin Turbo OC GTX 970

Asrock A320M Pro4

AMD Ryzen 1500X

GeIL Dragon AMD Edition 8GB DDR4

Kingston 60GB SSD

Corsair TX 650W PSU

 

Any help would be appreciated! 

 

My first guess would be the GPU, can you put the GTX 970 under an extended load? Something like Firestrike or a looping Heaven run should do, if it doesn’t do it do you have another GPU you can use to test for a few hours to see if anything changes?

[Relax']

Just now, TwilightRavens said:

My first guess would be the GPU, can you put the GTX 970 under an extended load? Something like Firestrike or a looping Heaven run should do, if it doesn’t do it do you have another GPU you can use to test for a few hours to see if anything changes?

I will try putting it under loud and see if that causes it to crash, I don't have a spare GPU. I was going to buy a new one anyone but I don't wanna do that if its my PSU or RAM that I need to replace.

[Relax']

3 hours ago, TwilightRavens said:

My first guess would be the GPU, can you put the GTX 970 under an extended load? Something like Firestrike or a looping Heaven run should do, if it doesn’t do it do you have another GPU you can use to test for a few hours to see if anything changes?

Seems fine under load, both GPU and CPU were fine, not sure what else I can try.

[TwilightRavens]

1 hour ago, Relax' said:

Seems fine under load, both GPU and CPU were fine, not sure what else I can try.

Okay so that rules out GPU then, for RAM try running hci memtest to at least 400% (1000% is optimal but 400% is usually good enough) if it doesn't report any errors it will most likely be the psu if i had to guess. You can also use memtest86 and boot it from a usb drive.

 

Also have you updated the motherboard bios? if not i recommend updating to the latest one that doesn't drop support for Summit Ridge CPU's (some drop Summit Ridge (1000 series) support to make room for Pinnacle Ridge (2000 series) and Matisse(3000 series)) also updating chipset drivers might be a good idea as well.

 

Here's the page for bios update for your board: https://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/A320M Pro4/index.asp#BIOS

 

Oh and one more thing, what version of the nvidia driver do you have? If the latest try a few versions back as sometimes new drivers can be bugged for older GPU's, I had a similar experience on my 1080 when I went from 417.35 to like 422 back when that was the current and the only way I fixed it was downgrading for a while, if you are on an older one then try the latest for the same reason I stated above.

[Relax']

6 hours ago, TwilightRavens said:

Okay so that rules out GPU then, for RAM try running hci memtest to at least 400% (1000% is optimal but 400% is usually good enough) if it doesn't report any errors it will most likely be the psu if i had to guess. You can also use memtest86 and boot it from a usb drive.

 

Also have you updated the motherboard bios? if not i recommend updating to the latest one that doesn't drop support for Summit Ridge CPU's (some drop Summit Ridge (1000 series) support to make room for Pinnacle Ridge (2000 series) and Matisse(3000 series)) also updating chipset drivers might be a good idea as well.

 

Here's the page for bios update for your board: https://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/A320M Pro4/index.asp#BIOS

 

Oh and one more thing, what version of the nvidia driver do you have? If the latest try a few versions back as sometimes new drivers can be bugged for older GPU's, I had a similar experience on my 1080 when I went from 417.35 to like 422 back when that was the current and the only way I fixed it was downgrading for a while, if you are on an older one then try the latest for the same reason I stated above.

Thanks for the response, RAM seems ok as I have tested with one stick in each slot and still had the issue. However in new developments I have encountered a freeze that just stays on on whatever I am doing and the PC is completely unresponsive, also encountered an issue when I restart the PC I black screened during the restart, it seemed to shut down correctly but then it was stuck on a black screen before I even saw the BIOS splash screen, my keyboard was not lighting up as it usually would but my PC was on and the fans spinning. There must be something causing these issues, going to try flash the BIOS now.

[BudGrillz]

Im gonna have to say its your 970.  I just had to replace my 960 a few weeks ago that had the same problems.  My Intel IGD would work find but with the 960 under power and in the PCIE Slot.  Sometimes it would display and at idle with no load it would be fine.  Few minutes into gaming or FurMark it would Black Screen and would have to try to turn on the PC On and off to get it to work sometimes.  Put in a new RX 580 solved the issue.

[Relax']

2 minutes ago, BudGrillz said:

Im gonna have to say its your 970.  I just had to replace my 960 a few weeks ago that had the same problems.  My Intel IGD would work find but with the 960 under power and in the PCIE Slot.  Sometimes it would display and at idle with no load it would be fine.  Few minutes into gaming or FurMark it would Black Screen and would have to try to turn on the PC On and off to get it to work sometimes.  Put in a new RX 580 solved the issue.

I am testing now and I stressed it under Furmark and it was stable however it seems to be freezing randomly when idle or just when browsing the web, even freezing before my PC POSTs, any ideas?

[TwilightRavens]

9 minutes ago, Relax' said:

I am testing now and I stressed it under Furmark and it was stable however it seems to be freezing randomly when idle or just when browsing the web, even freezing before my PC POSTs, any ideas?

It must be unstable in a lower power state, or when loading the driver. See if you can boot into safe mode, once you do go to device manager and disable the graphics driver, reboot into normal mode download DDU (display driver uninstaller), extract it and then reboot again into safe mode, run DDU and let it clean and restart your pc. Download the newest driver and install it, see if the issue persists. If it does then yes its most likely the GTX 970 causing it.

 

I somewhat doubt its the PSU because that CX kit you have is relatively new and its a decent power supply by Corsair standards. And if it was the SSD you’d most likely be getting file system errors left and right and it won’t let you boot into windows without a system32 error or bootsec record missing.

[Quickstrike]

5 minutes ago, Relax' said:

I am testing now and I stressed it under Furmark and it was stable however it seems to be freezing randomly when idle or just when browsing the web, even freezing before my PC POSTs, any ideas?

The problem with the 970 is that they run hot (that whole architecture does). Big temp gaps will use up a card. It might just have died.

[Relax']

14 minutes ago, TwilightRavens said:

It must be unstable in a lower power state, or when loading the driver. See if you can boot into safe mode, once you do go to device manager and disable the graphics driver, reboot into normal mode download DDU (display driver uninstaller), extract it and then reboot again into safe mode, run DDU and let it clean and restart your pc. Download the newest driver and install it, see if the issue persists. If it does then yes its most likely the GTX 970 causing it.

 

I somewhat doubt its the PSU because that CX kit you have is relatively new and its a decent power supply by Corsair standards. And if it was the SSD you’d most likely be getting file system errors left and right and it won’t let you boot into windows without a system32 error or bootsec record missing.

Thanks, I mean I am happy to buy whatever part I need to get a GPU if needed but of course there is the worry its the RAM, Mobo or even CPU however I think this is unlikely. Im still concerned if its the PSU but yes the one I have is pretty good so. The issues are just sporadic. 

[Relax']

12 minutes ago, Quickstrike said:

The problem with the 970 is that they run hot (that whole architecture does). Big temp gaps will use up a card. It might just have died.

Yea I mean it is the oldest thing in my build but its so random, I am using my PC right now and it seems flawless and then itll just freeze and Ill have to either hard reboot or itll do it on its own after freezing on black screen for a few seconds. 

[TwilightRavens]

54 minutes ago, Relax' said:

Yea I mean it is the oldest thing in my build but its so random, I am using my PC right now and it seems flawless and then itll just freeze and Ill have to either hard reboot or itll do it on its own after freezing on black screen for a few seconds. 

Best bang for the buck (if you don’t mind used) are pascal cards, you can get a 1060 under $100, 1070 usually under $200, 1070 ti under $300, 1080 under $400 and 1080 ti’s under $500.

 

or heck, 980 ti’s are under $200 now but I don’t recommend going Maxwell this late in its life cycle as a main GPU.

[Relax']

Lots more to report now, got one freeze mid game on CS:GO, keyboard lights went off this time and game audio was stuck in a loop. Then restarted and went back into the game got a blue screen for the first time with the error kernel security check failure. Restarted again and went back into game and got another BSOD with the error Memory management, pretty much narrows this down now to either the RAM or GPU. Hopefully the blue screens are related to the freezes because I have been playing around with the RAM all day! 

[Relax']

Ok tried each stick of RAM on its own and booted into game, both worked fine. As soon as I put two sticks in I get BSOD before I even get onto my desktop. Tried the other two DIMM slots on Mobo and got 4 beep codes the first time which could be the motherboard or RAM, I have never used them DIMMs before but then after it crashed from the beeps. After this no more beeps just a constant cycle of BSOD when im loading onto Windows. Now I am running 1 stick of RAM in the same DIMM slots that I am testing with. No error so far, is this a definite RAM issue or Mobo?

[TwilightRavens]

5 hours ago, Relax' said:

Ok tried each stick of RAM on its own and booted into game, both worked fine. As soon as I put two sticks in I get BSOD before I even get onto my desktop. Tried the other two DIMM slots on Mobo and got 4 beep codes the first time which could be the motherboard or RAM, I have never used them DIMMs before but then after it crashed from the beeps. After this no more beeps just a constant cycle of BSOD when im loading onto Windows. Now I am running 1 stick of RAM in the same DIMM slots that I am testing with. No error so far, is this a definite RAM issue or Mobo?

How many RAM slots do you have? If 4 then I would try the other pair of slots and see if that changes anything. If the same issue persists beyond that it's probably the motherboard.

[Relax']

6 hours ago, TwilightRavens said:

How many RAM slots do you have? If 4 then I would try the other pair of slots and see if that changes anything. If the same issue persists beyond that it's probably the motherboard.

So little update, I started getting blue screens when I was booting up, got a few different errors, memory management etc. and kernel security check failure so I assumed its defo the RAM or GPU but then I swapped the RAM sticks into different slots and noticed it blue screen in certain DIMM slots, so I have one stick in a slot that is working at the moment, (still getting the freezes) but yea could be motherboard, for some reason I feel like I am going to spend £400 and get my new GPU, better motherboard and a new lot of RAM and itll end up being the PSU or something... It mainly either froze on startup or BSOD either during start or just as I get onto my desktop. I just want to order the part but its a gamble.

[TwilightRavens]

7 hours ago, Relax' said:

So little update, I started getting blue screens when I was booting up, got a few different errors, memory management etc. and kernel security check failure so I assumed its defo the RAM or GPU but then I swapped the RAM sticks into different slots and noticed it blue screen in certain DIMM slots, so I have one stick in a slot that is working at the moment, (still getting the freezes) but yea could be motherboard, for some reason I feel like I am going to spend £400 and get my new GPU, better motherboard and a new lot of RAM and itll end up being the PSU or something... It mainly either froze on startup or BSOD either during start or just as I get onto my desktop. I just want to order the part but its a gamble.

I’d start with the RAM, make sure to get a b-die kit as Zen 1 will have less issues with it. Basically anything that’s 3200MHz (14-14-14-34) or 3600MHz (15-15-15-35) or (16-16-16-36) is guaranteed b-die. 3600 C16 will be your cheapest option as some kits are only like $80. If that’s not it then I would def try to snag a b450 or X470 board.

 

I’m willing to bet its one of those and not PSU, but I could be wrong as we can’t fully rule it out.

[Quickstrike]

8 hours ago, Relax' said:

So little update, I started getting blue screens when I was booting up, got a few different errors, memory management etc. and kernel security check failure so I assumed its defo the RAM or GPU but then I swapped the RAM sticks into different slots and noticed it blue screen in certain DIMM slots, so I have one stick in a slot that is working at the moment, (still getting the freezes) but yea could be motherboard, for some reason I feel like I am going to spend £400 and get my new GPU, better motherboard and a new lot of RAM and itll end up being the PSU or something... It mainly either froze on startup or BSOD either during start or just as I get onto my desktop. I just want to order the part but its a gamble.

If it's that RAM that worries you, make sure it's slotted in the correct way (slot 2 and 4 on most Ryzen mobo) and run MEMTEST. 
 

[Relax']

5 hours ago, TwilightRavens said:

I’d start with the RAM, make sure to get a b-die kit as Zen 1 will have less issues with it. Basically anything that’s 3200MHz (14-14-14-34) or 3600MHz (15-15-15-35) or (16-16-16-36) is guaranteed b-die. 3600 C16 will be your cheapest option as some kits are only like $80. If that’s not it then I would def try to snag a b450 or X470 board.

 

I’m willing to bet its one of those and not PSU, but I could be wrong as we can’t fully rule it out.

Cheers mate, new parts on their way, will let you know how it goes!

[Relax']

3 hours ago, Quickstrike said:

If it's that RAM that worries you, make sure it's slotted in the correct way (slot 2 and 4 on most Ryzen mobo) and run MEMTEST. 
 

5 hours ago, TwilightRavens said:

I’d start with the RAM, make sure to get a b-die kit as Zen 1 will have less issues with it. Basically anything that’s 3200MHz (14-14-14-34) or 3600MHz (15-15-15-35) or (16-16-16-36) is guaranteed b-die. 3600 C16 will be your cheapest option as some kits are only like $80. If that’s not it then I would def try to snag a b450 or X470 board.

 

I’m willing to bet its one of those and not PSU, but I could be wrong as we can’t fully rule it out.

Yea its weird im trying them in all different configurations and using different of the two sticks in each slot and getting weird BSODs either on boot or just after getting into Windows. If I manage to get into Windows itll stay on sometimes but then just freeze, either after a a few minutes or a few hours. It sometimes also just freezes and will not even get passed the BIOS screen, just boot loop. Both sticks in together are not working and it blue screens so using 1 stick at the moment in DIMM slot 4. No BSOD but still freezes on general use like when browsing the web or in a game. The issue has evolved a lot now, started with freeze and then go to a black screen, then started getting freezing with no black screen (just stuck on whatever im doing). Now getting freezes and boot loops and BSODs on the BIOS splash screen or when booting Windows. Hope I havent broken anything else but got a new Mobo, RAM and GPU coming anyway. Wasnt planning on spending big but im locked down from this virus anyway so gonna be on my PC alot.

[TwilightRavens]

15 minutes ago, Relax' said:

Yea its weird im trying them in all different configurations and using different of the two sticks in each slot and getting weird BSODs either on boot or just after getting into Windows. If I manage to get into Windows itll stay on sometimes but then just freeze, either after a a few minutes or a few hours. It sometimes also just freezes and will not even get passed the BIOS screen, just boot loop. Both sticks in together are not working and it blue screens so using 1 stick at the moment in DIMM slot 4. No BSOD but still freezes on general use like when browsing the web or in a game. The issue has evolved a lot now, started with freeze and then go to a black screen, then started getting freezing with no black screen (just stuck on whatever im doing). Now getting freezes and boot loops and BSODs on the BIOS splash screen or when booting Windows. Hope I havent broken anything else but got a new Mobo, RAM and GPU coming anyway. Wasnt planning on spending big but im locked down from this virus anyway so gonna be on my PC alot.

Might as well get a new psu as well since you are replacing the other things, just make sure its one near the top of this list: 

personally I’ll always recommend a EVGA PQ or P2 PSU as they have the lowest voltage ripple of any on the market.

[Relax']

1 hour ago, TwilightRavens said:

Might as well get a new psu as well since you are replacing the other things, just make sure its one near the top of this list: 

personally I’ll always recommend a EVGA PQ or P2 PSU as they have the lowest voltage ripple of any on the market.

Well Ill try putting in the new RAM, and if still problems then I will try the new motherboard too. Of course I will be installing the GPU regardless but if still problems after all of this then I will purchase a PSU, I think my SSD is working ok and I seriously doubt there is an issue with my CPU.

[Relax']

Managed to fix this, installed my new RAM and the system booted straight away, how both sticks failed im not sure? I decided to install the new motberboard anyway because it was better, and obviously the new GPU. Been a few days and all working fine. Thanks for your help everyone!

[Tolunay]

On 4/13/2020 at 3:35 AM, Relax' said:

Managed to fix this, installed my new RAM and the system booted straight away, how both sticks failed im not sure? I decided to install the new motberboard anyway because it was better, and obviously the new GPU. Been a few days and all working fine. Thanks for your help everyone!

I have been getting the similar issue. Pc randomly freezes and screen goes black. Without hard reboot it won't unfreeze. After rebooting my display driver temporarily disables and after another normal restart the pc works normal until the next freeze which randomly occurs. The issue doesn't happens during specific app or state, it is completely random, sometimes when i browse through chrome sometimes whem its idle. I've sent my motherboard(tufb550plus) and ram sticks(4x8gb3200mhzcorsair) to the service and they didn't find any problems. I don't trust the service since asus motherboards service only updated bios and sent it back to me but i already updated the bios before i sent the motherboard to the service. So i think problem might still be motherboard but not sure. I also stress tested both gpu and CPU and they seemed working fine at leat for 15 minutes under stress. I repeatedly did the test and didn't get any errors. I also replaced all the drivers and even i reinstalled a clean windows. I don't have any spare parts to replace neither  so i am confused which part to replace first. My psu is corsair rm750 gold which is a good one for my setup.

CPU : ryzen 5 3600

GPU : rog strix rx 5600 xt

Motherboard : tuf b550 plus

Ram : corsair 4x8 gb 3200 mhz ddr4

M2 ssd : james donkey 500 gb

And i am using two screens one of them is msi g241 (main one) the other one is old samsung led monitor(vga socket so im using hdmi switcher).

Note: i have been using this setup for almost two years and i didn't get such erros but after i moved to new apartment the issue started. Only thing that changed was my apartment. A friend told me the power instability might be the reason for this kind of issue but i am not sure about this either. So please help if you have any idea. I am running out of options and replacing the whole system one by one is very expensive for me at the moment.